About Sergii Leshchenko

Sergii Leshchenko is an investigative and political journalist. He is deputy-editor-in-chief of Ukrainska pravda, Ukraine's leading independent online media. He was a 2012 Fellow of the John Smith Memorial Trust and a Reagan-Fascell Fellow from 2013-2014. All views expressed are made in a personal capacity.

Each September sees a meeting of the Yalta European Strategy (YES), founded by oligarch Viktor Pinchuk to promote closer ties between Ukraine and the EU. With the deadline for an Association Agreement two months away, this year’s meeting was crucial, but as Sergii Leshchenko reports, they might just make it.

Ever
since becoming Ukraine’s president in 2010, Viktor Yanukovych has been
preparing for his next election in 2015 – and this time he intends to win
without the support of the oligarchs. But he needs cash, lots of it, and this,
as Sergii Leshchenko reports, is where "self-made" Serhiy Kurchenko comes in.

In a few months, the
EU will decide whether to sign an Association Agreement with Ukraine. President
Viktor Yanukovych is, however, focused on a different agenda - how to win a second term in
2015. He's ready to go to any lengths to bring that about, reports Sergii Leshchenko.

Ukraine’s President
Yanukovych has completed his takeover of his country’s TV channels, and is
making inroads into the internet. As
Ukraine faces a choice of whether to align itself with Europe or Eurasia,
Sergii Leshchenko wonders if there is a way back.

Last
October, Ukraine’s ruling Party of the Regions won only a slim election victory,
but President Viktor Yanukovych has taken the opportunity to pack his new
government with members of his ‘Family’ – and to level new and grave charges at
jailed opposition leader Yulia Tymoshenko. Sergii Leshchenko reports.

By means fair and foul, the ruling Party of the Regions came out top in Ukraine’s recent parliamentary election. President Yanukovych is far from home and dry, however: to control parliament he needs a majority, and the necessary concessions to other parties will certainly cost him dear, says Sergii Leshchenko

On 28th October, Ukrainians will elect a new parliament. Their country has moved in the last few years from the forefront of democratic transition in the post-Soviet space to a clan-based authoritarian regime, taking its lead from its neighbour Belarus. Serhiy Leshchenko reports on the state of play.

On 28th October Ukrainians go to the polls to elect a new parliament, but it is already clear that the election will not be fought by fair means. Sergii Leshchenko outlines the various, and sometimes ingenious, methods used to rig the vote.

European leaders’ decision to boycott Ukraine’s Euro 2012 has highlighted the role of Yanukovych as the new black sheep of Europe. Yet Yanukovych made his own own ‘European choice’ long ago – it is in there that he squirrels away his family’s fortune, writes Sergii Leshchenko